Legato

Full Description

Legato is a fundamental expressive technique requiring notes to be played smoothly and connectedly, with no audible gap between them. The word is Italian for bound or tied, and in notation it is indicated by a slur — a curved line drawn above or below a group of notes to be played in this manner. Legato playing is the default expressive mode of singing, and much of keyboard technique in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was aimed at approximating the vocal line on an instrument whose notes naturally decay after being struck. Bach developed a highly articulate finger technique that many historians believe was less strictly legato than the Romantic ideal that followed; it was with Mozart, and especially with Beethoven and Chopin, that the smooth, singing legato became the dominant goal of piano playing. On the piano, legato is achieved by keeping each key depressed until the finger moves to the next note, creating a moment of overlap that blurs the mechanical separation between strikes. The sustain pedal supplements this by sustaining resonance after the fingers have moved, though over-pedalling can muddy the harmonic texture rather than improve it. True legato — achieved through fingers alone, without the pedal — is the more demanding and musically honest technique. Legato passages require relaxed hands and arms. Tension is the enemy of smooth connection. Listening critically to the evenness of tone from note to note, especially across weaker fingers, is the core challenge of legato practice.